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<3&*sfczr       /?^  v. 


THE  AWFUL  HISTORY 
OF  BLUEBEARD 

ORIGINAL  DRAWINGS  BY 

W.  M.  THACKERAY 


WITH  AN  INTRODUCTION  BY 

TEMPLE  SCOTT 

j?  A  NOTE  ON  THE  LEGEND  BY 

CHARLES  VALE 


PRIVATELY  PRINTED 
FOR  JEROME  KERN 


Printed  by  Douglas  C.  McMurtrie,  ?{ew  York 


THE  INTRODUCTION 

THESE  delightful  drawings  by  Thackeray, 
entitled  by  him,  "The  Awful  History  of 
Bluebeard,"  were  found  preserved  in  a 
little  scrap-album  which  was  presented  to  Mary 
Augusta  Thackeray  by  her  mother,  on  the  child's 
eleventh  birthday,  March  26,  1841.  They  have 
never  before  been  published,  and  they  are  repro- 
duced now  to  engage  the  interest  and  arouse  the 
amused  appreciation  of  the  many  lovers  of  the 
great  English  novelist  and  humane  humorist. 

I  have  had  no  little  difficulty  in  identifying  the 
Mary  Augusta  of  the  album,  but  I  have  arrived 
at  the  definite  conclusion  that  she  was  Thackeray's 
cousin,  the  daughter  of  Francis  Thackeray,  curate 
of  Broxbourne  in  Hertfordshire  and  brother  of 
Richmond  Thackeray,  the  father  of  the  novelist. 
While  it  is  true  that  the  records  of  the  Thackeray 
family  make  no  mention  of  a  Mary  Augusta,  they 
do  give  a  Mary,  who  was  the  daughter  of  Francis 
Thackeray.  In  his  "Fragments  of  the  Past," 
privately  printed  in  1907  by  St.  John  Thackeray, 
a  son  of  Francis  Thackeray  and  a  master  at  Eton, 
reference  is  made  by  the  author  to  his  sister 
Mary  as  being  two  years  his  senior.  He  does  not 
call  her  Mary  Augusta,  but  simply  Mary.   That 


this  Mary  is  the  Mary  Augusta  of  the  album  is 
evident  from  the  following  facts: 

In  the  tiny  scrap'album  presented  to  Mary 
Augusta  in  1836  as  "the  reward  of  good  conduct," 
and  now  in  the  possession  of  Mr.  Jerome  Kern, 
are  two  entries — one  in  a  child's  handwriting,  and 
the  other  in  a  mature  hand.  The  former  was  evi' 
dently  written  by  the  child  herself  and  is  ad' 
dressed  "To  St.  John."   It  consists  of  six  rhymed 

lines : 

"Little  boy 
always  try 
To  be  your  parent's  joy, 

never  cry 
But  with  me,  ever  prove 
As  gentle  as  a  dove." 

The  "St.  John11  is,  of  course,  Mary  Augusta's 
brother,  who  was  a  boy  of  four  years  of  age  at  the 
time.  The  second  entry  is  a  rhymed  quatrain  and 
is  signed  "F.  T."  and  "M.  A.  T.11 

"Be  good  and  kind  my  little  Mary, 
And  never  let  your  temper  vary. 
Remember  how  this  gift  you  gain, 
And  every  peevish  word  restrain." 

The  initials  "F.  T.11  are,  no  doubt,  those  of  the 
child's  father,  Francis  Thackeray,  the  uncle  of 
William  Makepeace,  and  the  initials  "M.  A.  T." 
are  those  of  the  child's  mother,  Mary  Ann 
Thackeray,  nee  Mary  Ann  Shakespear. 


In  the  morocco  bound  solander  case  containing 
these  two  albums  is  a  water-color  drawing  of 
Mary  Augusta,  a  portrait  of  a  ten  months  old 
baby,  as  the  inscription  on  the  back  of  the  draw 
ing  informs  us.  At  the  time  this  drawing  was 
made  Thackeray  was  a  young  man  of  twenty, 
and  had  just  left  Trinity  College,  Cambridge,  to 
travel  in  Germany  and  France,  and  to  exercise 
himself  enthusiastically  with  art  studies.  It  will 
be  remembered  that  Thackeray  early  nursed  am- 
bitions to  become  an  artist,  and  his  first  writings 
which  were  illustrated  by  himself  were  published 
over  the  nom  de  plume,  Michael  Angelo  Tit- 
marsh.*  Even  as  a  boy  at  the  Charterhouse  School 
he  was  much  addicted  to  drawing,  and  many  of 
his  school  books  have  come  down  to  us  decorated 
with  his  efforts  in  this  direction.  His  mother  and 
stepfather  urged  him  to  enter  the  profession  of 
the  bar,  but  although  he  became  a  student  of  the 
Middle  Temple  and  read  law  with  a  "pleader," 
his  distaste  for  the  legal  profession  was  so  strong 
that  he  discarded  all  pretence  for  its  study  when 
he  attained  his  majority  in  1832  and  went  to 
Paris  to  study  art.  His  sojourn  in  the  French  capi- 
tal, however,  was  short  and  mainly  taken  up  with 
enjoying  its  pleasures.    In  December,  1832,  he 

*  Is  it  only  coincidence  that  the  initials  M.  A.  T.  of  Mary  Ann 
Thackeray,  Mary  Augusta  Thackeray  and  Michael  Angelo  Titmarsh 
are  the  same? 


was  back  in  London  seeking  channels  in  which  he 
could  find  the  work  meet  for  his  hands  to  do  and 
fulfil  himself.  Art,  somehow,  offered  no  field  in 
which  he  could  acquit  himself  with  any  sense  of 
fulfilment,  and  finding  that  his  stepfather  was 
connected  with  a  weekly,  the  "National  Stand' 
ard,"  he  took  up  journalism.  But  he  never  relin- 
quished the  hold  art  had  on  him. 

While  yet  a  youth  Thackeray  had  evinced  an 
unusual  gift  for  burlesque,  and  several  amusing 
parodies  in  verse  have  come  down  to  us  from  this 
period  of  his  life  which  testify  to  this  gift.  It  was 
rather  a  satiric  burlesque,  which  later  burgeoned 
in  his  social  studies  and  novels  of  contemporary 
life  and  manners.  But  the  first  expression  of  this 
satiric  side  of  his  nature  found  an  art  form  for 
itself.  There  is  no  doubt  he  had  a  genuine  flair 
for  caricature,  indulging  his  fancy  in  a  frolicsome 
spirit  only  whenever  occasion  offered,  yet  unable 
to  resist  imparting  to  it  a  rather  biting  humor. 
When  he  came  to  publish  his  writings  he  took 
upon  himself  the  task  of  interpreting  them  pic- 
torially,  and  these  illustrations  form  no  small 
commentary  on  his  judgments  of  the  individuals 
he  wrote  about  and  satirised  with  his  engaging 
humor.  All  his  early  works,  and  most  of  his  im- 
portant novels,  with  the  exception  of  "Barry 
Lyndon"  and  "Henry  Esmond,"  were  thus  illus- 
trated by  himself.   Thackeray  had  an  unbounded 


admiration  for  the  genius  of  George  Cruikshank. 
He  wrote  an  excellent  essay  on  the  man  and  his 
work.  There  is  evident  in  Thackeray's  drawings 
that  spirit  of  caricature  in  both  conception  and 
treatment  which  is  so  characteristic  of  the  great 
caricature  artist  of  the  nineteenth  century. 

The  story  has  been  told  that  when  Mrs.  Ritchie, 
the  aunt  with  whom  Thackeray  lived  when  a 
child,  found  that  her  husband's  hat  fitted  the 
little  boy,  she  carried  him  in  alarm  to  the  popular 
physician,  Sir  Charles  Clark.  "Don't  be  afraid," 
Sir  Charles  told  her,  "he  has  a  large  head,  but 
there's  a  good  deal  in  it."  There  was  so  much  in 
it,  indeed,  that  it  took  thirty-eight  years  before 
it  began  to  empty  itself;  and  its  owner  was  dead 
at  fifty-two.  What  was  Thackeray  doing  up  to 
the  age  of  thirty-eight?  Idling,  we  are  told — 
idling  in  travels,  idling  in  pleasures  at  the  French 
capital,  idling  in  amusing  himself  with  dabbling 
in  art,  idling  in  journalism,  and  idling  in  spending 
the  five  hundred  pounds  a  year  he  had  inherited. 
There  must  have  been  some  virtue  in  this  idling, 
for  in  the  fourteen  years  of  industry  which  fol- 
lowed Thackeray  wrote  himself  into  the  glorious 
rolls  of  England's  literature.  Would  that  we  had 
more  idlers  like  the  author  of  "The  Newcomes" 
and  "Vanity  Fair."  The  truth  is  that  a  man  of 
Thackeray's  nature,  keen  in  insight  and  loving  in 
heart,  must  ripen  slowly  in  beneficent  sunlight, 


that  the  acrid  odors  of  the  blossoming  soul  shall 
become  transmuted  into  the  vivifying  perfumes  of 
the  flowering  heart.  It  was  thus  that  Thackeray 
ripened. 

Even  his  drawings  evince  this  process  of  bur" 
geoning.  These  of  Bluebeard's  story  which  are 
dated  "London,  1833,"  while  they  are,  of  course, 
the  work  of  idle  moments,  are  yet  so  fulfilled  of 
Thackeray's  humorous  imagination  and  so  indica- 
tive  of  his  gift  of  caricature  that  they  deserve  a 
special  place  in  the  esteem  of  those  who  love  the 
man  and  all  the  ways  in  which  he  expressed  him' 
self.  Certainly  they  reveal  that  insight  and 
knowledge  of  human  nature  which  were  later  so 
richly  embodied  in  his  writings.  It  may  seem 
absurd  to  cite  these  slight  and  fanciful  delinea- 
tions of  a  fable  presented  to  a  child  for  her  amuse- 
ment, as  suggestive  of  the  mentality  of  the  author 
of  "Vanity  Fair";  but  slight  and  fanciful  as  these 
drawings  may  be,  they  yet  impart  the  same 
burlesque  humor  of  reality  tinged  with  a  melan- 
choly sarcasm  which  is  so  characteristic  of  Thack- 
eray, the  observer  of  human  blindness  to  its  own 
futilitarianisms.  They  give,  even  at  the  early 
date  of  their  execution,  the  direction  of  the  mental 
outlook  of  the  man  who  was  later  made  sad  by 
affliction,  but  who  recovered  himself  by  a  humor 
at  once  searching  and  kindly. 

It  was,  however,  in  a  frolicsome  and  humorous 


mood  that  Thackeray  executed  these  seven  draw 
ings  to  illustrate  the  story  of  Bluebeard.  The 
story  and  its  moral  must  have  touched  his  risibili- 
ties to  a  jocular  resentment,  for  they  are  really 
very  funny,  and  form  an  extravagant  burlesque  in 
sufficient  detail  to  enable  any  one  to  follow  the 
tale  from  its  improbable  beginning  to  its  artificial 
conclusion.  Although  drawn  with  a  pen  in  the 
sketchiest  manner,  every  picture  moves  one  to 
laughter,  so  happily  and  so  amusingly  is  the 
burlesque  realized.  The  faces  and  their  expres- 
sions, especially  those  of  Bluebeard  and  Fatima, 
are  pictured  in  all  the  serio-comic  possibilities  of 
the  situations  in  which  the  story  places  them. 
Thackeray,  the  young  idler  of  twenty-two,  must 
have  enjoyed  himself  hugely  both  in  making  these 
drawings  and  in  anticipating  the  pleasure  they 
would  give  to  the  little  girl  to  whom  he  sent  them. 
It  is  very  interesting  to  note  that  the  little 
album  in  which  these  drawings  were  pasted, 
seems  to  be  the  only  evidence  so  far  brought  to 
light  of  Thackeray's  relations  with  his  uncle  and 
his  uncle's  family.  That  Thackeray  should  have 
made  the  portrait  of  the  child,  Mary  Augusta, 
and  also  sent  her  these  Bluebeard  drawings  when 
the  child  had  attained  the  age  of  eleven,  would 
indicate  that  he  had  an  affection  for  the  girl  and  a 
strong  attachment  for  his  relatives  in  the  Brox- 
bourne  vicarage.    Apart,  therefore,  from  the  in- 


trinsic  merits  of  the  drawings,  they  have  the 
added  interest  of  being  a  record  of  the  great 
novelist's  abiding  and  happy  friendships  with  his 
relatives.  They  have  a  sentimental  association 
which  brings  the  man  Thackeray  very  close  to 
our  hearts. 

Temple  Scott 


THE      AWWVL 


@s 


<C<rn4&m.  ^ 


/M 


BLUEBEARD  TEMPTS  FATIMA  BY  GIVING  HER 

THE  KEY  OF  THE  LOCKED  ROOM,  INTO  WHICH 

SHE  MUST  NOT  GO 


FATIMA'S  DISCOVERY  OF  THE  CONTENTS  OF 
BLUEBEARD'S  LOCKED  ROOM 


^za 


BLUEBEARD,  HAVING  FOUND  THAT  FATIMA 

HAS  ENTERED  THE  SACRED  CHAMBER,  IS  ABOUT 

TO  DEAL  WITH  HER  AS  HE  DID  WITH  HIS  OTHER 

WIVES 


"*&/ 


FATIMA'S  SISTER,  ANNE,  ANXIOUSLY 

LOOKING  FROM  THE  TOWER  FOR  THE 

RESCUERS 


"^^ 


fzAJ 


SISTER  ANNE  SIGNALLING  THE  RESCUERS 


h-^- 


VYrT^N^\r- 


THE  RIDE  TO  THE  RESCUE  OF  FATIMA 


THE  DEATH  OF  BLUEBEARD 


THE  BLUEBEARD  LEGEND 

"This  door  you  might  not  open,  and  you  did" 

EDNA  ST.  VINCENT  MILLAY "BLUEBEARD"  (SONNET) 

THE  familiar  story  of  Bluebeard  found  its  way 
into  English  from  the  French  of  Charles 
Perrault's  "Barbe  Bleue,"  first  printed  in  his 
"Histoires  et  Contes  du  Terns  Passe"  (1697).  The 
Chevalier  Raoul,  whose  imperishable  sobriquet, 
of  course,  was  due  to  the  peculiar  color  of  his 
beard,  married  successively  six  wives,  who  all 
mysteriously  disappeared.  Fatima,  the  undis- 
couraged  seventh,  was  subjected  to  a  singular  test 
of  obedience.  Her  husband,  setting  out  on  a  jour- 
ney, placed  in  her  hands  the  keys  of  the  castle, 
with  full  permission  to  wander  where  she  pleased 
in  the  corridors  and  chambers,  with  the  exception 
of  one  room,  which  must  on  no  account  be  entered. 
Fatima,  her  loneliness  nourishing  her  curiosity, 
naturally  found  the  forbidden  door  irresistible :  she 
unlocked  it,  and  discovered  the  charnel  chamber 
of  her  predecessors.  In  her  terror  she  dropped  the 
key,  and  was  unable  to  obliterate  from  it  the  stain 
of  blood.  Her  lord,  returning,  detected  her  dis- 
obedience (which  he  had  anticipated)  through  the 
stain,  and  commanded  her  to  prepare  for  death  in 
five  minutes.  Her  sister  Anne,  however,  scanning 


the  horizon  for  possible  succor,  perceived  horse' 
men  in  the  distance.  She  signalled  to  them  and 
they  galloped  to  the  rescue,  arriving  just  in  time 
to  rescue  their  sister — for  they  proved  to  be 
Fatima's  brothers — by  slaying  the  implacable 
and  sanguinary  Bluebeard. 

The  role  of  the  fictitious  Chevalier  Raoul  has 
been  assigned  to  various  historic  characters.  The 
English  Henry  VIII  has  been  suggested  as  the 
possible  prototype:  maritally  and  temperament 
tally,  he  seems  qualified.  In  France  the  Bluebeard 
legend  is  especially  associated  with  Brittany;  but 
whether  the  traditions  identifying  the  monster 
with  Gilles  de  Rais,  or  with  Comorre  the  Cursed, 
a  Breton  chieftain  of  the  sixth  century,  were 
anterior  to  Perrault's  time,  cannot  be  satisfactorily 
determined.  The  claims  of  Gilles  de  Rais  to  the 
unpleasant  distinction  are  still  accepted  locally 
in  the  neighborhood  of  the  baron's  numerous 
castles,  particularly  at  Machecoul  and  Tiffauges, 
the  chief  scenes  of  his  infamous  crimes.  De  Rais, 
or  de  Retz;,  Marshal  of  France,  fought  stoutly 
against  the  English,  and  was  Joan  of  Arc's  special 
protector.  One  of  the  richest  men  in  the  realm, 
he  kept  open  house,  was  a  munificent  patron  of 
literature  and  music,  and  was  himself  a  skilled 
illuminator  and  binder.  He  also  indulged  a  pas' 
sion  for  the  stage,  and  the  original  draft  of  the 
Mystery  of  Orleans  was  probably  written  under 


his  dictation.  His  prodigality  dissipated  his 
wealth.  He  hoped  to  redeem  his  fortunes  or  mis- 
fortunes  by  alchemy,  and  also  consulted  necro- 
mancers, who  promised  to  raise  the  devil  for  him. 
But  he  raised  the  devil  himself,  committing  in' 
credible  atrocities.  His  servants  kidnapped  chil- 
dren, generally  boys,  on  his  behalf;  and  these  he 
tortured  and  murdered.  The  number  of  his  vic- 
tims was  alleged  at  his  trial  to  have  been  140,  and 
even  larger  figures  are  quoted.  He  was  eventually 
hanged  (not  burned  alive,  as  is  sometimes  stated). 
The  less  widespread  identification  of  Bluebeard 
with  Comorre  the  Cursed  is  supported  by  a  series 
of  frescoes  dating  from  only  a  few  years  after  the 
publication  of  Perrault's  story.  They  were  dis- 
covered in  1850,  M.  Hippolyte  Violeau  assures 
us  in  his  "Pelerinages  de  Bretagne,"  during  repairs 
to  the  chapel  at  St.  Nicolas  de  Bieusy  dedicated  to 
St.  Tryphine,  who  in  history  was  the  wife  of 
Comorre  or  Conomor:  in  legend  she  was  decapi- 
tated, and  miraculously  restored  to  life  by  St. 
Gildas.  The  frescoes  depict  the  Bluebeard  story 
in  five  thrills — (1)  The  marriage;  (2)  the  husband 
taking  leave  of  his  young  wife  and  entrusting  the 
key  to  her;  (3)  the  forbidden  door  opened,  and  the 
corpses  of  the  murdered  wives  hanging  within; 
(4)  the  husband  threatening  his  wife,  while  an- 
other female  (sister  Anne)  is  looking  anxiously 
out  of  a  window  above;  (5)  the  wife  at  the  mercy 


of  her  husband,  with  a  halter  round  her  neck;  but 
the  rescuers,  accompanied  by  St.  Gildas,  Abbot  of 
Rhuys  in  Brittany,  arrive  just  in  time  to  save  the 
future  saint. 

Besides  the  French  version  of  Perrault,  there 
are  tales  of  a  similar  kind  in  Straparola's  "Piace- 
voli  Notti"  (1569)  and  in  the  "Pen  tamer  one"  of 
Gian  Alesio  Abbatutio.  In  his  "Phantasus," 
Tieck  developed  the  theme  into  a  clever  drama; 
Getry,  in  his  "Raoul  Barbe-Bleue"  (1789),  gave  it 
the  setting  of  comic  opera;  the  younger  Coleman 
brought  out  "Bluebeard;  or,  Female  Curiosity"  in 
1798;  and  Offenbach  produced  his  opera  bouffe, 
"Barbe'Bleue,"  in  1866.  The  essentials  of  the 
story  are  found  in  various  folklore  tales,  none  of 
which,  however,  has  attained  the  fame  of  Blue- 
beard. A  close  parallel  exists  in  an  Esthonian 
legend  of  a  husband  who  had  already  disposed  of 
eleven  wives,  and  was  prevented  from  killing 
the  twelfth,  who  had  opened  a  secret  room, 
by  a  gooseherd,  the  friend  of  her  childhood.  The 
story  of  The  Third  Calender  in  the  "Arabian 
Nights"  will  readily  present  itself.  The  forty 
princesses  were  absent  for  forty  days,  but  gave 
King  Agib  the  keys  of  the  palace  before  their 
departure.  He  had  permission  to  enter  every 
room  except  one.  His  curiosity  (like  Fatima's)  led 
him  to  open  the  forbidden  door,  and  mount  the 
horse  which  he  found  in  the  chamber.  The  flying 


steed  carried  him  through  the  air  far  from  the 
palace,  and  with  a  whisk  of  its  tail  knocked  out  his 
right  eye.  A  similar  misfortune — so  precise  was 
the  horse's  judgment  of  distance,  and  so  powerful 
its  retributive  tail — had  previously  befallen  ten 
other  princes,  who  had  warned  Agib  of  the  danger 
before  he  started. 

The  Bluebeard  legend  belongs  to  the  common 
stock  of  folklore,  and  has  even  been  ingeniously 
provided  with  a  mythical  interpretation.  Its  real 
significance  obviously  lies  in  its  discouragement 
of  intrusive  curiosity;  and  its  moral  is  priceless 
and  timeless.  Let  no  modern  Fatimas  or  Agibs 
peer  inquisitively  into  the  secret  chambers  of  the 
past:  they  may  discover  too  much.  Dead  loves — 
murdered  loves — may  be  multiple:  but  why  dis' 
turb  the  skeletons?  Sufficient  unto  the  day — or 
the  honeymoon — is  its  own  tragedy,  or  its  own 
comedy. 

Charles  Vale 


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